4 Questions You Should Ask Before Buying a Piece of Leather Furniture
Buying a piece of furniture is a big investment. This why it’s so important to avoid rash decisions and ask a sales associate all about the leather piece you’re interested in.
Unfortunately, we’ve found making a leather furniture purchase isn’t always as straightforward as it should or could be. There’s a lot of misinformation out there.
We don’t know about you, but we prefer transparency. This is why we’re sharing some of the best questions you can ask yourself and a sales rep (whether in person or online) before making your purchase.
4 Questions to Ask Before Investing in Leather Furniture
These are our top four questions to ask before investing in your new furniture. Getting the answers to these questions will ensure you end up purchasing a piece which you’ll be truly happy with for many years to come.
1. Can I Buy Leather Pieces If I Have Kids or Pets?
This is something a lot of people worry about. They fear their kids or pets will ruin their expensive leather furniture.
While leather can be damaged – it can be punctured or ripped – this doesn’t mean it’s necessarily delicate. A lot of people with children and pets have leather because it is actually quite durable.
You might ask a salesperson or online sales rep whether a particular piece you’re considering has a good reputation among those with kids or pets.
2. What Type of Leather Should I Invest In?
There are four different types of leather. Ask which type of leather your preferred furniture piece comes in to find out if you’re really paying for the level of quality you expect for the asking price.
- Full Grain – Leather that the surface has not been altered. Full meaning left in its most natural state. This grain is only on top grain leather.
- Top Grain – This leather is the first cut. The most desirable for upholstery. Soft and more supple and used by all the better leather furniture makers. You can have a corrected, embossed or full top grain.
- Split Leather – This comes from the middle of the hide. It’s processed to flatten its naturally soft/fuzzy texture and a pattern is imprinted on it to look like top or full grain leather.
- Bonded Leather – This leather is made from leftover leather scraps. They’re ground and died. Then, glue is added to it or it’s fixed to a synthetic material. Because it’s made up of mostly synthetic material, it doesn’t breathe like leather.
3. Why Does This Leather Piece Have Blemishes?
Seeing blemishes on a pricy piece of furniture can make you question whether it’s worth the price. Let us assure you, it often is. Real leather is made from a hide, which has natural imperfections. Over time, some of those imperfections can become even more pronounced.
But this is what so many people love about leather. They find beauty in the imperfections. Plus, in many cases, the imperfections point to the leather being of higher quality (full grain vs. split leather, for instance).
4. How Much of the Furniture Is Actually Covered with Leather?
This is such an important question to ask. Manufacturers sometimes like to cut costs or corners by covering only the visible parts of a chair or sofa with leather. The parts you can’t see are covered with a synthetic material.
If you don’t mind this, that’s fine, but you shouldn’t be paying the same price for this sort of piece which you’d pay for one which is 100% leather.
Look out for labels which read “made with” a certain type of leather. This is usually shorthand for “not 100% leather.”
Do Your Homework Before You Shop – You’ll Be Glad You Did
It can be so easy to walk into a showroom like or check out a leather furniture website and fall in love with a piece of furniture such as Bradington Young. Leather is so beautiful and there really is something for pretty much everyone. But it’s really important to avoid impulse buying at all costs, especially when it comes to this kind of purchase.
Leather isn’t necessarily inexpensive, and large pieces of leather furniture should definitely be considered an investment. As with any investment, it’s vital to do your research first.
Just as we wouldn’t make financial investments blindly, we wouldn’t want to buy leather furniture on a whim either.
Research is needed to ensure an educated decision. When we do our research and ask the right questions, we can be sure we’ll end up with a quality piece of furniture which will last.